Tag Archives: old soul

Her previous thoughts on motherhood had brought her no peace. There were times she feared them even; intolerably changing tram cars when in too close of a proximity to a small child or sometimes a pregnant woman; feeling her own intimidation at the span of her life rise up in her: What would happen if she were to have a child?

It was as if she was allergic to the very idea of it, perhaps until she was ready, with time. Except that readiness never really arrived: Fear simply changed places with acute loneliness to which the sometimes seemingly easy solution presented itself in a trustful face of an infant. Maybe, that’s it. May, that’ll fix it. Maybe, if only she had a baby, she’d learn how; and perhaps, she’d grow softer. But it could also be just the very opposite — losing traces of self in the chaos of unknowing; and every single time, she shook the idea out of her hair as if it were a mere layer of dust from the construction site she passed every morning, on her way to the university.

“But you don’t have much time!” the other women warned her, their faces altered by some insider knowledge, for which she was expected to be grateful. Many had already procreated more than once by her age. “You’ve gotta try it,” they suggested with knowing smiles. “You’re gonna love being a wife!” (No one ever stopped to differentiate between the two events: motherhood and marriage did not have to be bound into a sequence.)

And she’d seen her own former school mates float around the city bazar with growing swellings of their stomachs — “I didn’t know she’d gotten married already!” — appearing too hot, uncomfortable or weighed down; rarely looking blissful. To her, the young mothers appeared to have gone distances. They were gone, off to the places outside of all this: This place, in the middle of winter, always just making it.

Most of Larisa’s girlfriends had left the town in the first five years after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Angela got into a law school in St. Petersburg. Oksana left for Israel. It happened in such a rapid succession, she didn’t get a chance to ask anyone yet: Do you feel that way sometimes too? (Larisa’s mother seemed to have no tolerance for such questions.)

Meanwhile, mother’s girlfriends dropped loud hints in her vicinity:

“Perhaps, Larisa is just not into it.”

“All books — no boys.”

A bluestocking, the librarian type. An old maid. Larisa wasn’t necessarily plain looking, but had always been bookish; and that would be intimidating to anyone, let alone a man with a domestic proposition for her.

“She should try putting on lipstick sometimes. She’s not that bad looking after all!”

It had to be a particular quality to the Russian women: to cross the lines of respect into forced familiarity, as if, just on the mere basis of their common sex, they could treat her as an fumbling ignoramus. Some of her mother’s girlfriends she always found invasive and somehow intentionally diminutive. It was if they knew better, and she should too. Often disguised with good wishes, they invaded and pointed out where she somehow didn’t measure up to the accomplishments of others, even though she, all along, strived for something different; something more specific, more organic to its environment: like the color of sunset before a thunderstorm, or the way her footsteps sounded after each first snowfall and they moved the heart to awe by the magnanimity of it all, even though it couldn’t be — nor needn’t be — described.

And then, there was their insincerity, one might even call it “mean spirits”. Larisa looked to her mother for a back-up, but the woman didn’t see it her way: Mother was always better at belonging:

“Such things, Larisa, they take a woman’s heart to understand!”

The little girl had let go of her grandmother’s skirt, sat down onto the dirt floor of the church and rested her chin on top of the propped up knees. Larisa hadn’t noticed that the child had been studying her. The hum of the recorded organ had carried her away; not because she would’ve rather been elsewhere. No, she enjoyed drifting off like this, and then observing the world from a haze of her own thoughts; vague and left better undefined.

And she had known men — one Pyotr Nedobry — who forced their own thoughts to be defined and insisted to interpret hers. With attentiveness rooted in hunger, Pyotr would study her with desire: as if she could fix it, be his long sought-out solution, whatever had been missing out of her life. And when he, last May, lifted her up over his shoulder and ran toward the lake, she was expected to laugh. Instead, she couldn’t catch her breath. Too late, she thought. Such romance no longer tempted her. Or maybe, she was the type to have lived out her youth already, for there was nothing left to miss of it; no delightful memory but the mournful knowledge that she, indeed, was never really youthful.

Pyotr Nedobry placed her down, that day, on the lawn, by the bank.

“The dandelions!” Larisa tenderly whispered. They were everywhere!

“Oh, I know! So annoying!” Pyotr exclaimed, and he took off his jacket so that they could sit down without staining their clothes. Not at all what she had meant!

They spoke while looking out. He would pick up blades of semi-dry grass, small branches, sharp-edged pebbled and continue sticking them into her slip on shoes. Hurtful, irritating — he demanded too much!

If she were to go for it, she knew at first the attention would be elating; and it would lighten her days for a while. But she had already done that, a number of times! Once with a student from Argentina who convinced her that he would be her life’s regret if she didn’t let him woo her. He wasn’t. And all this attention eventually turned on itself. Everything that they would learn of each other could become ammunition, for it was humanly impossible for one woman to get the job done. She would grow tired and mourn the mysteries she’d surrendered under the influence of lust.

“All these girly secrets!” Pyotr smirked, looking down at her, sideways. He was already becoming mean.

And she — was already gone.

Larisa looked up at the statue of Christ. The sun, parting the clouds after a week of snowfall, shined through the colored bits of the mosaic windows; and a column of caramel-colored light came down onto the thorn-crowned head. Larisa felt warmer: That’s it! That’s how she wanted to discover beauty: never expecting it, never molding the circumstances that were out of her control; but by simply and habitually mending her spaces, she could give room for it all — to flood in.

Here is the thing with me this morning, my comrades; here is the thing:

Defeatists make me lose my hard-on, for life!

Because no matter my own chaotic, insane; perpetually hysterical or complicated; difficult or impossible to decipher mindset, I tend to march around this kinky town while daring to have a stubborn enthusiasm for some good livin’.

“What?!” you might snap. “You call yourself a Russian?!”

Well, here is the thing, here is the thing: Yes, there is an inherited quality to my former nation’s character to be dark (and perhaps, to be simultaneously or accidentally poignant, thank goodness). And yes, Motha Russia is a continent full of old souls nostalgic for their lost innocence. And finally, yes: No other nationality seems to beat us at our love for death. Because in death, we no longer suffer, da?

But the other national quality of my former motha’land — is an ingrained desire for some stubborn livin’ (not necessarily good livin’ — but livin’ nonetheless). Be it an incredible vastness or beauty of my Motha Russia; but the variety of its scenery makes our old souls want to howl at the moon, with desire. Or is it love? Or wanting to take in one more breath — because in it, there still may be some hope? (One of my favorite thinkers o’er there once identified this quality as “godliness”.) Da: Motha Russia — is one gorgeous motha’fucker; and she makes you want to live.

“You are an artist: You CANNOT be a defeatist!”

Who said that?

On this 175th day of my rant blogging, my thoughts on the meaning of art appear to be better formulated. (They better be, da?) This year, I’ve had a slew of mouth-foaming arguments on the definition of art and who exactly identifies it as such; and what makes it last; and whether or not art makes any difference at all.

And here is the thing, there is the thing: I believe that art — is in the eye of the beholder. And yes, it does indeed have the power to change a mind, a mood, and maybe even, to change a heart. But making a difference — cannot be an artists’ objective. Or at least, it cannot be this artist’s objective. Because I live — in the very doing of it. It is the process of creation that turns me on. Kinda like breathing.

Because in it, there still may be some hope, da?

Which must be why the mandatory discipline of it comes to me with such ease. As for its sacrifices — they merely add inches to my writerly dick. ‘Cause here is the thing, here is the thing: I could take an easier route; perhaps, get myself one of those nine-to-five gigs, excel at it and settle for a more mundane survival. Maybe, I could play it up a bit on weekends or live vicariously through my affairs with men. And eventually, I could start raping other dreamers with my skepticism, hating them for reminding me of my own unhappening ambitions. And I could wait for my death. Because in death, we no longer suffer, da?

“And that is exactly where defeatism must dwell: Wherever the soul surrenders its dreams.”

Who said that?

“Man, I hate this fucking town!” a comrade I hadn’t heard from for months was venting to me last night.

I got his spiel. Really, I did. I was’t even judging. Because I too have faced some challenges in this city and allowed my inability or fear to expand beyond the difficulty of the moment; then, blame the entire city for it. Because here is the thing, here is the thing: LA-LA is one of the most common scapegoats for personal failures. Here, the defeated equal the dreamers. (But oh, how I have always wished for the defeated to move on; to return home or to leave for better suitable cities! But for whatever geographical reasons, they stay, making this — the capital of defeat. So: Thank goodness for its dreamers. Because in them, there still may be some hope, da?)

Last night, I tried to work with the brother, trying to convince him out of his hatred:

“Yeah, but look at all these things you have accomplished!” I strained my memories of our rare encounters for any recollections of his pursuits. Sadly, there were none. None that I could remember. Yet, still, somehow, in this man’s occasional sweetness and simplicity — in his mere breathing — I saw some hope.

But he was on the roll by then: “I mean: There are no jobs here! And the women are shit, and…” He wasn’t even listening.

I studied his face and wondered what had brought him here in the first place, to this city shared by dreamers and the defeated alike. Surely, there had to be a plan, a vision; or perhaps, a former love. And what made him stay here, long enough to immerse into the pool of such bitterness and self-pity?

“So? What are you up to?” he had exhausted himself with his monologue and politely remembered that I was still there. He wasn’t a complete goner, I suppose. Not yet.

But no way! No way was I going to tell him of my dreams, still in the making; of my art — still in the happening.

Because here is the thing, here is the thing: I believe that art — is a celebration of life. It’s a celebration of livin’, not necessarily good livin’ but still: Livin’! Stubborn livin’ in pursuit of love, in pursuit of hope — all of which must live in the very next breath; in the very doing of it. And it is this very pursuit that makes my livin’ — a good one. And good livin’ — is a celebration of the miracle that is self.

“I want… I want… What is it that I want?” she was squeezing herself into the corner of a vintage, peach-colored chair that couldn’t have been a better throne to her feminine divinity.

She scanned her eyes across the tiny room she’d made her home, as if the answer were somewhere around there: Was it under this tiny bed that she’d surrounded with her art and nature? Or had it fallen out of these mismatching picture frames in various degrees of hanging on and leaning against the walls, as if Frida Kahlo herself had been living, working, pacing here? Had she slipped it, by a forgetful accident, into the unfinished pack of cigarette on her windowsill — the only visible sign of her insomnia and self-destruction, committed in the name of the departed, then turned back into her art; her nature.

“I want to be adored! Because I — I adore!”

This entire evening I had been watching this face — and all that hair — and her gentle grace; and I had been wondering: Was I just like this, in my own youth? Or did I possess more corners: All anxiety about my self-sufficiency and my self-enough-ness?

I’ve arrived here from a harder history, you see. For centuries, it had been unforgiving to our women’s youth and tenderness. Back where I came from, we worshiped our men, but only behind the closed doors of our bedrooms. For the rest of the day, it was a nation filled with female fighters, women-survivors –hustlers — who assumed enemies in every living soul (especially other women, younger and more tender) and who are most content when standing in breadlines.

But by now, I had paid my dues around here. I had suffered and survived the often ungraceful — and sometimes undignified — existence of an immigrant. I had done my share of standing in different lines to get approved as worthy; only to rush myself back to the university library and learn at double the speed, just so that I could be more than that: Just so I could be equal. And I worked. I worked hard, harder than most of my colleagues, American or foreign-born, like me. And only behind the closed doors of my bedroom would I worship my men: For the rest of the day, I was just an Amazon, refusing to let them in on any of my softness.

“I want to be adored,” she repeated, then looked in my direction. Had I seen it laying around her artist’s quarters, by any chance: This adoration that she deserved and was willing to return ten-fold?

“You know?” she asked, then didn’t wait for my answer and said, “You do know.”

My comrades and enemies had so far been unanimous at calling me out on my generosity. In my motha’s fashion, I tend to grant it upfront, as if to back up my name with it. My name: Truth. (Or Faith, depending on which language you speak, or whom you ask around here.)

But even that has altered a little bit with age and cynicism: I am slightly more withdrawn these days; more careful. Because I have yet to raise a child, so I cannot give it all away. And because I myself haven’t finished dreaming yet, so I need my strength. Because these days, if a lover’s departure must be easy at all, it is only if I hadn’t lost myself in him. So, I take my time now. I only meet my people half-way. And I wait: I wait to see if I am — to them — indeed, the adored one, too.

Some souls though! They still know how to draw it out of me: this uncensored generosity, this kindness that hangs in the back of my first name, like the middle initial “V” by which I had been called for most of my life (in all languages). And she — the soul resembling the past child in me and the future one, at the same time — had been like this from the first embrace she’d once decided to grant me. Never once had I caught myself wondering if I was going out too far on the limb, for her sake. Because I knew that her need — was not all consuming; that I wouldn’t lose myself in it (even though, I’d much rather, at times). And in her case, my generosity felt returned ten-fold: The more I gave, the more it replenished me.

So, despite the exhaustion (that this late at night begins to feel like defeat), I had shown up to her home. Other women had come and gone already. I could tell by the variety of the pink shades of lipstick they had left of champagne glasses. A couple were in the midst of departing as soon as I arrived:

“Here! You look like you need a lot of space,” they seemed to be saying while peeling on their coats, and sweater, and ponchos, and shawls.

And I did. I did need (even though I had come here only to give). I immediately dominated her bed. I took over her library, dreaming of the day I could find my own name leaning on it, sideways. And after the last woman departed, I took over the kitchen too: Putting away the disorder, just so in the morning, she would find a clean slate.

She chirped behind me — my darling sparrow! — about whether on not to discard this aging chunk of cheese, or whether or not to dismiss this old lover. Occasionally, I would look back — at that face and all that hair — and wonder: Was I just like this, in my own youth?

But then, suddenly, I blurted out:

“Did the other women bring you food?” My words came out commanding and little bit too loud. She got silent. I landed:

“Oh my! So sorry! I’m so sorry!” Wiping my hands on the towel with force, like all the women in my family do, I gushed: “I sound like my motha. I’m so sorry!”

But her face showed no evidence of having been undermined or offended.

Instead, she rather seemed tickled by this hard softness of mine — an underbelly she must’ve suspected long ago (or why else would she decide to grant me her embrace?). She was in the midst of being adored — by me — and she knew it. She adored it.

And I, suddenly finding myself standing out on a limb, didn’t mind this incomparable generosity of mine: Because it was already replenishing me, ten-fold.